Lone Liberal needs help and/or perspective!

[apnu]

Hello all, I'm a long time lurker and rare poster here, but I have something of a troubling issue where I work and I need some perspective and/or help before I go insane!

Where I work, I'm the lone liberal and Democrat. My entire division is conservative and Republican with one token Libertarian. Now, they know my political leanings. It's not an issue of me trying to hide it, even if I did they'd figure it out because we all work pretty close together and you just pick up on that stuff after a while. So I don't bother, and when asked my opinion on a political topic I give it in all Democratic Liberal glory!

Anyway, they like to play a game I call "Baiting the Liberal" where they try to either convince me that the GOP is the way to go, or expose the insanity within me because I'm Liberal. Now, I'm fine with that because all the pushing and jeering they try only solidifies my resolve against their agenda, but I'm deeply troubled by the clues to their true nature.

What disturbs me is this: The incredibly skewed perspective Conservatives have against Liberals. It's not that these guys are Coulter or Limbaugh fans -- they aren't, in fact, they hate Rabid Ann and Fatboy. But they truly have no idea what our stance is. They live in a black-and-white world where you are either for ousting Saddam or you want him in power and you are willing to go to Iraq and help him toss bodies in a wood chipper.

This is so far beyond "you are with us or against us," this is "you are with us or a serial killer." They can't conceptualize how we Liberals can be anti-war and anti-dictatorship. How we can decry the greed infecting our society, and at the same time protest Communist China.

I mean to say, that this lack of understanding of the issues at hand. And a lack of understanding that there are two sides to an issue. And a lack of understanding that there can be more choices besides “A” and “B.” Combine, from my perspective, into a dangerous combination that can lead only to misery and war. That creates a heartless, callous attitude that eats away at the very humanity and (most importantly) closes their ears to anyone who doesn’t exactly agree with whatever it is in their head.

So my question is two fold: Does anybody else find this kind of extreme contrast appalling, and what can we do to take the rose colored glasses off these kinds of people?

[denverbill]

1. Just curious. How old are these people? n/t

[La_Serpiente]

2. These people are wrong to have a

mentality like that. They are basically "results oreinted" and do not look at the matters of process.

Me? I was for taking out Sadaam, but now was not the time. IN fact, one coudl even argue that Sadaam was a stabalizing force in the region. Him and Osama WERE ACTUALLY ENEMIES!!!! Sadaam was the only one in the region who aggresively stamped out religious extremeism. Also, we are now undertaking this HUGE public works campaign over there. What is going to happen to our country? We must be cogizant of that. The mistake of Americans is that we live in this huge bubble and think that because our economy is so big and our military is so huge that we don't think about the negative consequences of things. Our infrastructure is crumbling and so is the social safety net.

[DK666]

3. Havent...

Havent you seen the later freeper rage. Stickers that say "Kill all Liberals" Its the mentality.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

4. I have a simple philosophy:

I am a bleeding-heart liberal, and if you don't like it, I'll smack you in the nose and help you bleed with me. ;-)

Effete Liberalism is not for these times. We have to be able to defend ourselves on every level.

[rogerashton]

5. I was having dinner with the only conservative in my

Unitarian congregation, and he was of the opinion that Hillary will be elected President -- and said that if she were, he would leave the country, go live in Britain or France. I said, "So you would go and live with the cheese-eating surrender monkeys?" He suddenly remembered that Francophilia is no long PCC (politically correct for conservatives) and went off on how he couldn't possibly live in France. (Well, remember a few years ago the French threw out their socialist president and elected a 'conservative' and so France was very PCC until new signals came from the Big Cheese-not-eater.)

Seems like conservatives can't keep track of whom they are supposed to hate without hints from an attentive leftist --

Thing is, this is a guy whose friends at the congregation are mostly liberal to leftie -- if he doesn't know what real liberals are in favor of, it's not because he never heard. There have been a couple of liberal expressions -- I almost said excesses -- in the group that he is really angry about, and he can't see beyond the answer. He believes what he wants to believe, and spends a lot of quality brainpower rationalizing it to himself.

So I dunno. Progressives are pragmatists -- maybe it would help to say: "here's a problem. How would YOU solve it." and then when he comes back with "carpet-nuke the suckers," I might say, "that appeals to me too, at the emotional level. But does it solve the problem? Or does it make the problem worse?' etc. But I don't hold out much hope for reasoning with conservatives. Sooner or later we are just going to have to carpet-nuke the bastards.

[SlavesandBulldozers]

6. what i like to do

is expose the Conservatives as not conservative at all. In other words, do they consider themselves fiscal conservatives? If so, ask them why they support Bush who is not a fiscal conservative despite the fact that HE SAYS HE IS, which makes him a very fiscally liberal liar. Are they about individual accountability as most conservatives are? Then ask them to explain why CEO's are not held accountable for their actions by this Administration. This makes them look as if they selectively enforce laws, and that those laws which are least enforced are those which are broken by the top 1 percent (who are mostly Conservative). Are they against welfare, as most conservatives are? Then ask them why they support corporate welfare, such as the Post Sept-11th airline bailout package. DO NOT LET THEM off the hook when they try to explain that the airline bailout was to save the U.S. economy. Once they begin seriously arguing that it was necessary to bailout the airlines then inform them that they officially support welfare and are thus categorically not conservative! Bam!

Remind them that what you are arguing about is principles, and as long as one makes exceptions to principles one is being unprincipled. Nothing hurts a conservative worse than to be shown as unprincipled, it's like their garlic and crucifix.

[MadHound]

7. Hi, and Welcome to DU, you're amongst friends here

And yes, I too find it appalling, disheartening and disgusting. I've seen this mentality creeping into our public discourse during the past twenty five years, but it really picked up steam during the Clinton years, and now that their boy Bush is in office, these folks think that they now have license to run wild.

I combat it with the truth. When somebody rants on and on about "gotdamn liberal" I ask them for prove to back their ass up on whatever outrageous claim their making. I also give them truth, making sure to cite chapter and verse to back my ass up. That, plus some quick one liners to make them think("hey, I'd rather have a tax and spend Dem than a borrow and spend 'Pug, at least the Dem will keep the books balanced") can go a long way towards changing hearts and minds.

Of course it helps that I'm big enough to forestall any physical intimidation that they might try.

[Brucey]

8. Welcome to DU! You seem very literate and

well-spoken. If you can't get the message through to them, I doubt if anyone else can. We all experience the same thing. But some people do come around if they are smart enough to think through the complexities of the issue, or experience problems with conservative government policies, or hear liberal views often enough to understand them.

[zeemike]

9. Oh yes I know them well

But the advice is to you.
The first thing is that you are never going to convince them with facts or logic. They have been sucked into an ideology that will preempt all facts and logic with slogans and simple catch phrases.
So what can you do? Number one is to maintain your dignity and support your positions with morality. And that is much easier to do than you think sense you do have the moral high ground. And this is especially true if your are a Christian because the words of Jesus supports everything that you say.

[PROGRESSIVE1]

13. True! They need to loose their jobs! That may just....

get them to think their conservative stances over.

[texastoast]

10. Maybe THIS will be helpful . . .

During the recent Texas redistricting uproar, one of the more conservative IT guys came to work on my computer. The subject of the Democrats' temporary relocation to another state came up. My tunnel-visioned conservative friend said, "They are nothing but a bunch of yellow-bellied cowards. They all need shooting." To which I replied, "Well, at least they are not a bunch of lying, greedy, thieves."

End of discussion.

I have also found that quoting the Founding Fathers (and believe me, they are on OUR side--read your history), is one of the more effective ways to get the repukes (and this happens often--hee-hee), to throw up their hands and whine, "Oh, I just hate politics. I hate the Democrats and the Republicans. Wah-wah-wah, etc." It's at that juncture that I enjoy pointing out that the "Under God" didn't come into our Pledge until the 1950s.

YOU cannot make people think. Perhaps your intelligent responses (with footnotes) will inspire them to view another point of view (nah--they will just call you an intellectual elitist Liberal). However, we should all be troubled by the true nature of the Repukes (think, What Would Jesus Do? and you can be sure the Repukes will find a whiney excuse not to do it with some other argument in the Bible).

So, there are a couple of tools for you. We got the Founding Fathers card and we got the Jesus card. The pubbies are nothing more than a bunch of Pharisees.

[Nadienne]

11. Gawsh, I don't know how anyone can be conservative!

What a bunch of vermin they are! Greedy bastards. "If I have to contribute something, be it time or money or thought, then by God I'd better get a double-return for my investment!"

[Catholic Sensation]

12. Talking to my friend one time

He said it's whiney liberal progressives like me that keep dictators like Hussein and Hitler in power.

I ended the discussion by saying that it's chickenhawkish, lying, short sighted conservatives like him who create terrorists like Pol Pot, Usama bin Laden, and Augusto Pinochet. Needless to say he didn't want to continue the discussion.

Whenever the topic of Saddam comes up, just remember, conservative hero Reagan gave Saddam whatever WMDs he has ever used.

[MissMarple]

14. Liberal issues are usually human issues, quality of life issues.

They probably want the same things, but rhetoric often divides us. Instead of finding pragmatic ways to solve problems we have been divided by political rhetoric. This benefits the people who are in power and who want to stay there, but it does nothing toward making the U.S. a better place.

The Republican or conservative side has appealed to a wide set of constituencies. There are internal contradictions in their stated positions because of this. What have they really done for education except more unfunded mandates? What are they doing to solve a health care system in crisis that delivers less and costs more than any other industrialized country? Other than tax cuts and hope in a trickle down, how exuberant is U.S. job production. On free trade, how does that mesh with steel tarriffs that have hurt U.S. companies that use steel and possibly cost more jobs than it saved in the steel industry? Government has grown a lot, oversight is less. Cronyism is alive and well. This administration immediately put Richard Perle, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Lawerece Libby in influential government positions. They all wanted to go into Iraq during Desert Storm. They patiently waited their chance. They took advantage of opportunity. So what was all the talk about Sadam and WMD? Was it just old news from the 80's? Does Zionism play a part?

Why does a conservative party, traditionally an inward looking hands off the rest of the world party all of a sudden want to save the world, or more specifically special parts of the world linked to oil, from "bad people"?

And why does a publicly proclaimed "Christian" president cater to the worst, unJesus like, angry, Bible thumping, puffed up Christian cultists, instead of following the words of Jesus Christ?

Now, you won't change their minds, but you might want to explore some of these issues. And just lighten up, smile, and know that things usually correct themselves sooner or later.

[Cleita]

15. I get most of my talking points from DU.

I back them up with RELIABLE sources. They can't argue down facts. Many walk away and don't talk to me anymore. Others try to tell me that there really isn't any difference between the two parties. (That sounds familiar, doesn't it.) They can never prove that last statement.

[BeFree]

16. Good Thread, People!!

apnu, you wrote:
"...a heartless, callous attitude that eats away at the very humanity ..."

That's been my experience also, when it comes to hard core pugs.
It is as if there is a hatred for humanity deeply imbedded in these folks.
A "Get outta my way, or else" attitude illuminates their outermost reflections. You can see that in their eyes on the highways.
I hate to say this about anybody, but these kind of people sure do seem as if they really are, deepdown, anti-human.

[Nadienne]

17. It's a "pro-me anti-everyone else" sentiment

It's as though they think they are the only ones in the world. "Me, me, me" and everyone else is a means to my own ends.

"Can't they see? Don't they understand? They must bend to my own will! I am the main character, the hero, the center of the universe. If they stand in my way (by protecting the masses from me), then they are obviously evil..."

[newyawker99]

18. Hi apnu!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[Syn_Dem]

19. Welcome!

I hope you find an oasis of retreat here :)